Li He pulled the little girl to her feet, got his bearings, and headed toward the direction where the fog was thinner.
The jungle was unnaturally quiet. The only sounds were their feet rustling over the thick layer of humus and the little girl's trembling breaths.
They walked for about ten minutes.
All around them stood endless rows of enormous tree trunks.
Above them stretched a dense canopy of dark branches and leaves, as dull as iron.
The fog grew thicker, flowing through the narrow gaps between the trunks until it squeezed their field of vision down to almost nothing.
Oppressive! Dead silent! Suffocating!
Li He's heart sank lower and lower.
Something was wrong!
Very wrong!
The farther they went, the thicker the fog became. Yet the scenery around them never changed: the same gray trunks, the same narrow gaps.
It was as if they were walking in place.
Or was this space itself repeating endlessly?
At first, they could still see a dozen meters ahead. Now even anything beyond five meters had grown indistinct.
An indescribable sense of being watched quietly crept over him.
Crack!
A strange sound.
Li He spun around.
It was only the little girl accidentally snapping a dead branch beneath her foot. Seeing how sharply Li He had reacted, she grew frightened and pressed even closer to him.
Li He stared into the white fog.
Deep within it, behind those identical tree trunks, his martial artist's senses told him that countless eyes were watching him.
"Get out here!"
Li He's gaze turned fierce as he suddenly threw a punch!
His fist carried the true intent of destruction and slammed into a thick gray tree trunk.
Boom!
A muffled crash.
The trunk toppled, crashing to the ground and scattering humus and splinters.
The surrounding trunks remained